I received this sweet note in my inbox and just have to share it with you. ;)
"I have recently had the great pleasure to meet your daughter who is serving in our ward now, in Winchester, VA! What a wonderful young woman she is, and she has been such a blessing already to our ward family and to my own family, as well. (We have a 5 yr old daughter, Darby, who ADORES her!)
This picture that I have attached for y'all is special...
can you tell what she's eating??
Yes, that's right, a HAMBURGER!!!!
Not a veggie burger or a tofu burger, but a BEEF PATTIE filled hamburger!
We had to take pictures of her taking her first bite, and then I'll send you another of her as she actually chewed and swallowed it!
She ate the WHOLE thing, too!!!!
Poor thing, we are going to make a meat-eater out of her yet... she's already had a grilled chicken salad at our house, too!!!
I hope that y'all enjoy these, and I hope one day to meet y'all!
I am ever grateful for the special young woman that you raised so well!"
I just have to say at this moment that I sure miss my sweet Danielle...I wish I could just wrap my arms around her. Feels like such a long time since I've seen her or heard her voice. BUT she is doing amazing things and as one of her friends mentioned this week ~ "She is out changing lives." And she is...I hope one day to meet these special people who are watching over, caring for and feeding our little girl!" Thank YOU!!! And I cannot wait to hear Danielle, I just know she's going to be saying "Y'All" ... makes me smile just thinking about it!
And now on to the letter of the week from this sweet girl!!!
Miracle of the week!
The lovely Sister Stradling and I were out in Middletown this last week right around dinner time and were STARVING! But we didn't want to go back to Stephans City for dinner yet because we had a few more people we wanted to try and see while we were already there. We had just left the home of one of our less active members, and we had a great time with her. She is so sweet, and hopefully soon her life starts looking up for her :) We had planned to invite a few others out to the ward dinner we had that weekend, and we just couldn't leave! So we decided the best choice would be to go to the Dollar General to pick up some goldfish crackers; Whales, to be specific. And hey, only spending 50 cents on dinner is always a good deal:)
As we got to the cashier, I KNEW I needed to talk to him, but I was at an all time loss of words
(rare... usually I can't stop talking...)
and I couldn't even remember how to say "Hello."
But Heavenly Father had other plans.
The Cashier looked at our tags and said, "You know, I've been looking for a church."
Well fancy that! We have one!
Our first lesson with him was POWERFUL.
I was crying through part of it.
He said he's been praying for three weeks straight to know what church to join, and when he saw us, he knew.
When we set expectations with him, he said,
"I want to learn how to come closer to Christ; I want to join your church."
Needless to say, he was so excited to accept the invitation to be baptized.
He also expressed how he wants to serve a mission, and that he's already helped two of his friends come to know Christ.
Holy cow.
He's amazing, all he needs is three Sundays at church and a few lessons, other than that, he is all ready to go!
Does God prepare His people?
Indeed he does.
We also have another lady, Miss Kathy, who has been going through some hard times. We haven't had a chance to teach her much, but this week we finally were able to!
She was having a
BAD
BAD
BAD day,
and was angry as all get out.
We listened to her rant for 45 minutes,
and then finally she asked us what she should do.
It's amazing what prayer can do for the soul.
When we explained to her that Christ knew EXACTLY what she was feeling and that He loved her enough to take away the anger if she would let Him, everything changed.
We sat in a circle with her and her two grandsons, and we each took a turn praying.
She went from hot anger to absolute peace in less than a minute.
Afterwards, she asked us to come back the next day and start teaching her. When we got there, she had a billion questions and wanted to know everything. We started her out in the Book of Mormon, and as we explained how it goes hand in hand with the Bible and can help her live a happier life, she was so excited to read it.
I know this gospel blesses families and individuals.
I watch it EVERY single day.
And there's no doubt in my mind that this is where it's at.
If I could express to you the pains that people have explained to me, it would blow your mind.
Horrid circumstances,
histories wracked with abuse and neglect,
problems that take a lifetime or longer to overcome-
everything is always resolved,
always healed,
always always always made better
through the Gospel and Atonement of Jesus Christ.
It really is amazing.
On Saturday was the General Relief Society Broadcast (for all of the women in the church.) Bishop and Sister Knecht (some of the most amazing people on earth!) invited us over to watch it with them over ice cream (how could we say no to that offer??) and at the VERY last moment we decided we needed to call a girl named Maria who had just moved back into the ward and invite her to come with us. Turns out, she and her boyfriend Sebastian (who we are teaching) decided that they would come (again, who says no to ice cream?) and it was really neat! He got a little Jealous that it was only for the women (although he did feel special being among the few men who watched the whole thing) and said he couldn't wait to watch the other sessions, especially the Priesthood session (which I'll be watching for the first time because he asked us to watch it with him.)
During the session, he sat on the flood drawing.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
"Sister Lytle, I drew you a picture of Jesus, surrounded by angel bunnies." (picture proof coming soon. It's magnificent.)
The trees here are all beginning to turn colors. AHH! It's so pretty! Someday, I'll send home the video we took while driving down one of the super pretty streets in Winchester, and I'll take another one of the same street as soon as all the trees turn :) It's stunning here!
Love you all!
Sister Lytle
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